English: Thorncombe Church, Dorset, monumental brass of Sir Thomas II Brooke (died 1418) of Holditch Castle in the parish of Thorncombe (son of Sir Thomas I Brook (d.1367)),^[1] and his wife Joan Hanham (d.1437). He was "by far the largest landowner in Somerset"^[2] and was 13 times a Member of Parliament for Somerset. The Brooke family originated at the manor of Brooke near Ilchester in Somerset. His son Sir Thomas III Brooke (c.1391-1439) was a Member of Parliament for Dorset and Somerset, and was the husband of Joan Braybrooke (1404-1442), suo jure 5th Baroness Cobham, via her mother Joan de la Pole (d.1434). Sir Thomas III Brooke's son was Edward Brooke, 6th Baron Cobham (c. 1415-1464).

Sir Thomas II Brooke was a Lollard and opposed ostentatious display. His will (typical for a Lollard) describes himself as a ‘wrichyd synner’ and asks God to ‘fouchesafe to receyve [his] wreched unclene soule into his mercy and kepe hyt from dampnacioun’. He ordered his body to be buried at Thorncombe where people ‘gosh over into the church at the south side ryghte as they mowe steppe on me, and a flat playne stone save my name ygraved tharin ... and nether huche [coffin] ne leede to be layde in, bote a grete clothe to hely my foule caryin’. Thus although he ordered a plain ledger-stone, his wife, who died in 1437, was buried next to him under a large and magnificent monumental brass. (source: Biography of "Brooke, Sir Thomas (c.1355-1418), of Holditch in Thorncombe, Dorset and Weycroft in Axminster, Devon", published in History of Parliament: House of Commons 1386-1421, ed. J.S. Roskell, L. Clark, C. Rawcliffe., 1993 [1])

Unusually both he and his wife are shown wearing the Lancastrian Collar of SS (Hamilton Rogers, pp.15,245). Only a small part of the inscription remained, and the four shields are gone. The new church at Thorncombe does not occupy the same site as the former one, but the effigies have been preserved and inserted in another ledger-stone and placed in a relative position therein on a low tomb, with this restored inscription (Somersetshire Archaeological and Natural History S. Proceedings (Volume 44)[2]) "as restored on the brass, fresh (1877) set in the new Church":

"Here lyth Sir Thomas Brook. Knyghte, the which dyed the xxiii day of Januier the yere of our lorde mccccxix the fifth yere of King Henry the fifth. Also here lyeth Dame Johan Brook the wyfe if the sayd Thomas the whyche dyed the x day of Apryl the yere of our lorde mccccxxxvii and the xv yere of Kyng Harry the VI on whois soules God have mercy and pite that for us dyed on the rode tree Amen." (Hamilton Rogers, p.245)

Hamilton Rogers (p.245) described the brasses as follows:

"Thorncombe: The fine brass effigies of Sir Thomas and Lady Jane Brook of Olditch Court in this parish, that originally lay on the floor of the north aisle of the old Church. He wears his hair polled, is clad in a long gown with loose sleeves, pulled in at the waist by a belt studded with roses, and edged at the bottom and round the neck with fur. She appears in a reticulated horned head-dress with cover-chief, long close boddice gown, with mantle over, fastened across the breast by a cordon with dependent tassels. Both wear the collar of SS., have a dog at their feet collared, the lady's being belled in addition".